


Thursday

by Dogsled



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Coda, Grieving Dean Winchester, Heartache, I Made Myself Cry, M/M, Mixtape, Season/Series 12, Spoilers, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-26
Updated: 2017-09-26
Packaged: 2019-01-05 18:16:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12195129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dogsled/pseuds/Dogsled
Summary: Post S12 Coda. Dean and Sam return to the bunker after Castiel's funeral, finding it much as they left it: a complete wreck. Dean can't face the night in his room, and finds himself in Castiel's, instead, only to discover that the angel has left something for him.Makes light use of S13 spoilers, but you'll miss them if you blink.





	Thursday

**Author's Note:**

> Fair warning: I am trying to make you cry when you read this fic, so if it does that then it's done its job.

The bunker was a metaphor for his life.

 

What with everything that had happened since, Dean had forgotten what state they’d find their home in when they returned: the beer bottles, hammers and dust; books everywhere, blood everywhere, dead people and broken tables.

 

Then there was the giant fucking hole blown in one wall, like a gunshot in the back of the bunker’s skull, or a gaping chasm in a broken heart.

 

When he looked at Sam, his brother looked shell-shocked too. They’d both forgotten. It wasn’t just Dean whose grip on reality had been knocked for six.

 

After burning his best friend’s body and driving half a day across the country, Dean was exhausted, both emotionally and physically. He hadn’t even been able to sleep in the back seat the way he usually did after a hunt, the gentle lull of the Impala’s engine no anaesthesia against the gut-wrenching misery that tempered every breath with fresh pain.

 

Living was too hard, and if this was the end result of Amara’s parting gift to him then fuck her very much.

 

The bunker was a wreck. Even the _idea_ of tidying it up filled him with despair. Sam caught something in his expression, maybe, because he said “I got this,” and didn’t complain when Dean went shuffling off in the direction of their rooms.

 

He’d stood outside his own door for half a lifetime before he realized why he couldn’t go in.

 

How could he sleep? How the fuck could he sleep when his mother was gone, when Cas was dead, when he’d let Sam convince him to burn the body because it was the _right thing to do_. How could he sleep? He knew he would, so completely bone tired now that he could barely keep upright, so how could he go into that room and put his head on his pillow and let this day be done? He couldn’t. His hands smelled of wet moss from collecting fallen branches, and his clothes stank overwhelmingly of bonfire smoke and meat and decay, but he couldn’t convince himself to take them off. If this day was done, then it was done. It was over. He’d have to let Cas go the way Sam insisted he should: because their mom was still alive, and someone had to go and save her.

 

Dean locked his knees, swaying on the spot as misery came on the upswing, punching through him again. He’d fallen once already. Since then he’d stood beside the fire, stood when they faced Jack, stood strong against the impending threat of angels. He’d kept his eyes clear and dry while he gripped the wheel in a white knuckled death grip. It was coming back to him now, though, the agony swirling and commanding, choking him with all the unshed tears that he’d had to keep down for Jack’s sake, just to keep Junior on point.

 

But here Dean was. Here he was afraid to go into his own room, afraid to let this day end, because that meant there’d be no taking it back. It had taken almost two days for him to fall asleep from exhaustion the first time he’d lost Sam; Dean remembered it as though it were yesterday. It hurt less because it was so long ago, but he knew that at the time it had felt like this. He’d done whatever he could to save Sam. But Cas? He’d let Cas burn. What kind of friend did that make him? What kind of _brother_?

 

Rigidly, Dean tore himself back from the door. He couldn’t let it end like this. He had to do something, had to acknowledge his loss somehow, even if it was just with lots and lots of beer.

 

His feet stopped again outside Castiel’s quarters. Dean let himself inside, closing the door quietly behind him. Unlike the rest of the bunker, Castiel’s room was untouched, had been that way since the last time he was here, when he’d tried to give Dean back that mix tape. He’d played him, taken the Colt from under his pillow, and with it – it felt – he had robbed him of all the safe, established things their relationship represented. After all the years that Dean had worked on forgiving him for his betrayals, Cas had come down from Heaven and – using all the skill Dean had taught him over the years – he’d taken him for a ride.

 

\--And not in a good way.

 

In the centre of the bed was a manila envelope with the word “Dean” written on it.

 

Dean didn’t notice the rest of the room. In fact, from the moment he noticed the envelope it all sort of zoned out, fuzzy around the edges. His heart sank.

 

It took him so long to actually move to the bed that Dean was sure the day had passed into the next. He still stank, though. He was still tired, so it must still be Thursday after all.

 

He sank down on the very edge of the bed, picked up the envelope in shaking fingers, and flinched as a black tape fell into his lap.

 

It was that goddamned mix tape. Of course it was. The words stared up at him. The secret kisses in “TRA xx”, the desperate hope to convey his love without baring his heart and stating it out loud, as Cas had done when he lay there dying.

 

At once Dean felt a sharp spike of rage, even if he knew perfectly well that it was misdirected. He’d said it was a fucking _gift_. He’d ordered him to keep it. Which part of that didn’t Cas get?

 

But Cas was dead, he reminded himself. Cas was dead, and Dean couldn’t stand to be angry at him any more. Cas was _dead_ , so what was the fucking point?

 

There was a letter inside. He took it out and stared at it, unable to even so much as read past the first line for a minute or so. When he did, it near enough destroyed him, as if he wasn’t halfway there already.

 

 

_Dean_ ,

_I know what you said. It isn’t my intention to make you angry, but this is not a gift I feel I can accept, knowing that I have once again – in full knowledge of my actions – betrayed your trust in me. Please know that I am doing this to keep you out of it. This thing with Kelly, with Lucifer’s child… It’s on me, Dean. I lost her when I lost you. Moreover, I was the one who let Lucifer out of the Cage. Ultimately this mess is all my fault, and if I do nothing else with my miserable life it must be to correct at least some of the many mistakes that I have made. I must prevent this child from being born, whatever the cost to me, and if I have the chance to end Lucifer I will take that as well. I must._

_I regret that it means I must do this to you. You have called me friend, family, even brother. I don’t deserve any of that, Dean. I have tried. I’m no hunter. I looked for you, when you were taken. For months I looked for you. I failed. It feels as though all I do any more is fail. All I ever do is disappoint you. I don’t blame you. I disappoint myself._

_I can’t even tell you how I feel about you._

_That’s why I can’t accept the tape. A mix tape is a romantic gesture. I’ve watched enough television to know that, and Metatron filled me in with more than enough details of fictional romances old and new. I have never told you what I feel about you in words that you understand. I tried to. I have tried. I failed at that, too. And I betrayed you. I don’t deserve your love, even the small gesture that this tape conveys. But most of all, Dean, I don’t believe given what I’ve had to do that you will be able to forgive me this time._

_I’m sorry. I am so sorry. Goodbye, Dean. I love you. I love only you._

_Yours always,_

_Castiel._

 

 

There were headphones on the shelf behind the bed, and an old, well used tape player probably scavenged from the bunker’s storage. Dean drank beer and listened to the tape – Side A, Side B, Side A, Side B, over and over again - and he cried until his face hurt, until his head hurt, until his eyes itched and burned like raw coals in his skull. At some point he fell asleep in the clothes that smelled of death and fire; of burning angel and ruined hope.

 

When he woke up, it wasn’t Thursday any more.


End file.
